


the future makes of you what it will (the recreational time travel remix)

by pocky_slash



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Canon Disabled Character, Established Relationship, M/M, Old mutants in love, Remix, Self-cest, Time Travel, Trolling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-11
Updated: 2014-05-11
Packaged: 2018-01-24 07:27:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1596578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pocky_slash/pseuds/pocky_slash
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They probably should have destroyed those time machines once they fixed the future, but while they have them, Erik doesn't see why they can't do a little more recreational meddling.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the future makes of you what it will (the recreational time travel remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [professor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/professor/gifts).
  * Inspired by [The future's what you make of it](https://archiveofourown.org/works/598779) by [professor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/professor/pseuds/professor). 
  * In response to a prompt by [professor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/professor/pseuds/professor) in the [remixmadness2014](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/remixmadness2014) collection. 



> **Ces** provided the original prompt, **professor** provided the original story, and **redacted** sent me the link and told me I should remix it, so this goes out to all three of those folks ♥

"I have an idea," Erik says into the space behind Charles' ear, the line of his jaw, the curve of his neck.

"Another?" Charles says. "Well, out with it. If it's anything like the first, I'm sure to enjoy it."

"Not about that," Erik says. He aims for grumpy, irate, but misses entirely as he spots a freckle on Charles' shoulder that he's compelled to kiss. "About...the dilemma at hand. The one your Canadian bulldog cocked up."

"Logan did adequately," Charles says. "The future was saved. Do let's not talk about Logan in bed, love."

"Yes, but," Erik starts to say. He can tell the exact moment that Charles gives up and reads his mind instead.

"Oh, you old romantic," he says, opening his eyes and twisting his neck to take in Erik's second attempt at a grumpy expression. "His mission was to save the future, not to interfere with our mess of a relationship."

"It's not a mess," Erik says tartly.

"It is too a mess," Charles says. "It was especially messy back in 1973, if I recall correctly."

"Well, then let's not go back to 1973," Erik says. "We'll go earlier."

"'Go back?'" Charles asks. He raises a single eyebrow. "Darling, the world's been saved."

"So now we have plenty of time to improve the time machine, sweet talk Katherine into powering it for us and do a little additional course correction," Erik says.

It's entirely possible he's gotten unforgivably soppy in his old age.

"You have," Charles agrees, but he kisses Erik again. "Of course, I may have as well. When were you thinking?"

"Summer 1962," Erik says. "Might as well nip it in the bud, after all."

"A second honeymoon in the midst of our first," Charles says. "How could I possibly say no?"

***

"You two are ridiculous," Kitty says as they sit on either side of her, dressed in the closest approximation of war-torn fatigues they could find in their professorial wardrobes of the current timeline. Erik is dusting off the helmet he hasn't even looked at in years. "If you fuck up the future again, we're all going to be really pissed, you know."

"We won't, _ketsele_ ," Erik assures her.

 _If anything, we'll be fucking up the past,_ Charles says, his grin smug at the unspoken pun.

 _That's the idea,_ Erik says.

"You know, we can always tell when you're being gross with each other, even if it's not out loud," Kitty tells them.

"Power up the machine, Kitty," Charles says.

***

When they arrive in the mansion in 1962, they've not quite rehearsed a story for their younger counterparts, but all of their years together have made them startlingly better at compromise than they would have imagined even a decade earlier. Their improvisation is flawless, and before long, Charles is telling Erik, _divide and conquer_.

"There are things you should know," Erik says to his younger self. He eyes the younger Charles with what he hopes is wariness. His Charles makes a face that looks pained and angry to the untrained eye, and ridiculous to Erik, who knows it's how Charles looks when he's trying very hard to seem stern and unapologetic while what he really wants to do is laugh.

"Yes," Charles says through his teeth. "There are things you should know too." He looks at younger Charles significantly and younger Charles eyes the wheelchair and nods. 

"What don't we go to my study?" he says. Then, to his Erik, "The library?"

Young Erik nods once, sharply. He opens his mouth, still pinning his Charles under an intense gaze, but he doesn't say anything. He shuts it and nods again, then stalks down the hall towards the library. Erik follows.

 _I had forgotten how dramatic you were,_ his Charles says.

 _Don't you have a sob story to be crafting?_ Erik says. All he gets in response is a sweet burst of amusement and affection. 

Young Erik is standing in front of the window, arms crossed, glaring.

"And what lesson do you have to impart on me?" he all but sneers. Heavens, but Erik was an upstart bastard in his youth. 

_How did you ever put up with me?_ he asks Charles across the house.

 _It helped that you were built like a Greek god,_ Charles tells him. 

Erik eyes himself in the afternoon sunlight and concedes Charles' point.

1962\. He was angry. He was untethered. He was inexperienced. He was embarrassingly, wholeheartedly, immensely in love with Charles Xavier. It was, for Erik, an overwhelming combination of first love, schoolboy crush, respect, attraction, lust, homosexual awakening, and many years of ignoring his libido, all working in tandem to change everything Erik knew about love and sex over the course of only a few months. He can still remember those heady days, young and hasty and overwrought in his affections. If it had been legal, or even imaginable for two men to be married in 1962, Erik would have proposed before they even left on their road trip. 

Time, maturity, life, and knowledge of various timelines and futures have settled what Erik feels for Charles into something more respectable and befitting a man of his age and dignity. He thinks he and Charles' relationship is stronger now than it was in 1962, but it was certainly hotter and brighter and more impulsive back then. Erik is counting on that.

"There's a war coming," he says to his younger self. "You must prepare."

"I know," young Erik says. "I'm ready."

"You only think that," Erik says. "You have a long way to go until you're truly Magneto."

"Mag-what?" young Erik says flatly. "What are you talking about?"

"Your transformation into the leader you're destined to be," Erik says. Young Erik smiles slowly. Erik can tell from the way his shoulders straighten and his eyes glint that he's preening, smug with the knowledge that he's destined for great things. "Yes, yes," Erik continues, "once you leave Charles paralyzed and take on your own agenda--"

Young Erik deflates just as suddenly. His eyes are wide as saucers.

"Wait!" he says. "I _what_?"

"You abandon Charles," Erik says with a shrug. "As you were always going to do. Your ideals are so much larger than his, your vision for the future--it's impossible to shape the mutant world the way you must with his constant campaign for peace surrounding you. No, of course you need to break away to truly achieve your dreams."

"Break...." Young Erik's mouth is literally hanging open.

"You'll always love him, of course," Erik continues. "But needs must, and your needs are not just your own--there's the cause to consider, after all. And Charles, pacifist that he is--" Charles hates it when Erik calls him a pacifist, but it took Erik a long time to accept that he wasn't. An embarrassingly long time. It took, in fact, Charles throwing a shoe at him in 1983 and shouting, _I recruit, train, and direct a covert mutant strike team to protect the sanctity of mutant-human relations, you enormous idiot!_ for it to really sink in. "--just isn't ready to make those decisions. He never will be. But that's fine--you're strong. Strong enough to take him on, to throw him aside in battle, even as he sits there in the wheelchair you put him in. Strong enough to use him as a conduit to try and turn Cerebro against the human population. Strong enough to hold him captive for the human media to show them what mutants are really capable of. Strong enough to--" 

He wracks his knowledge of every time stream they've seen and encountered.

"Strong enough to rip him from the arms of his bride on their wedding night--"

It's a good choice. Young Erik goes ashen, then red.

" _What?!_ " he shouts. "Are you _crazy_? How could you? I-- _we_ \--love him! He wouldn't--I mean, we wouldn't do those things to him! We can't!"

Erik schools his expression blank and emotionless.

"Oh," he says. "But it's for the _cause_. The greater good, and all that."

"I don't care!" young Erik says. "I'm not doing that! I'm not becoming you! I won't be Magneto, not if it means--" He gestures. "That!"

He pushes past Erik and stomps out of the room. Erik smiles to himself and then follows.

"Charles!" young Erik shouts as he races down the hallways. " _Charles!_ "

Erik follows sedately. He's rather sure young Charles needed less convincing than his counterpart, and as such, he has a feeling his Charles is busy.

Young Erik yanks the door to Charles' study open with his powers.

"Char-- _what_?"

Erik catches up just in time to see his Charles grinning, bright eyed, and mussed, and the Charles of 1962 sprawled on the floor, kiss-flushed and sporting an impressive erection already.

"Ah, youth," he says out loud.

" _What_?" young Erik says and Erik sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"I swear, at one point your oratorical skills will improve immensely," he says.

"Be kinder to yourself, my love," Charles says. "It's your fourth language, after all."

"True," Erik says.

" _What is happening_?" Erik's younger self seethes, and all of the metal in the room begins to vibrate in place. Younger Charles looks startled, but it's nothing more than a flick of Erik's control to steady it all. He glares reproachfully at his counterpart.

"We were just--" young Charles starts to say, but he stumbles and stares up at young Erik with those huge blue eyes, looking guilty and still aroused. 

"It's really more like masturbation than infidelity, when you think about it," Erik tells younger Erik. Younger Erik makes a high pitched noise. "It's for the greater good."

"The greater good," Charles echos. "And, honestly, if we don't have a problem with it breaking the sanctity of our marriage--"

It's young Charles' turn to make a high pitched noise.

" _Marriage_?" he says.

"Oh yes," Charles says. "The future is full of wonderful things. Homosexual marriage is legalized, civil rights take leaps and bounds forward, there are more television channels and programs than you can count, you can order pizza on your computer and have it delivered to your house, and in 1998, the most remarkable pill comes on the market."

"We're happy to provide a demonstration of that last one," Erik adds.

His younger self still looks stunned, but young Charles is very obviously coming back around. Erik smiles and waves a hand, closing the door to the office as young Erik still stands motionless in the middle of the room. Erik has no doubt he's going to come around, and from the way he's staring at Charles' hands unbuttoning his shirt, he'll be coming around very quickly indeed.

 _You always get me the best presents,_ Charles says. He grins at his younger self, who quickly gets back up and takes over unbuttoning his shirt.

 _Happy Anniversary,_ Erik says.


End file.
